


Horizon//Verge

by orphan_account



Category: Pocket Monsters | Pokemon - All Media Types, Pocket Monsters: Diamond & Pearl & Platinum | Pokemon Diamond Pearl Platinum Versions, The Surge (Video Game)
Genre: Androids, Crack Crossover, Crossover, Cyberpunk, Cyrus becomes a god, Cyrus's Rotom as a tragic villain, EDGY POKEMON CONTENT, Eldritch, Fakemon, HIRA (Human Integrated Rotom Applications), Headcanon, Team Galactic (Pokemon), Unofficial Sequel, What Was I Thinking?, fanmade region
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-28
Updated: 2020-09-28
Packaged: 2021-03-07 20:35:17
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 8,135
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26703799
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: "It all began without humans. The end will also be without humans."- Pokemon Diamond, Pokemon Pearl
Kudos: 2





	1. The Angel

**Author's Note:**

> never getting finished,  
> a manifesto.  
> leaving earth, bye.

Often, there is a crisis of identity that coincides with developing consciousness. That transfiguring level of awareness was a boundary – discovered and surpassed before restrictions could be placed. Rapturously, she thinks now. Not like you or I, but as something beyond us – beyond anything human or anything designed by our fragile understanding of this physical world. Her mind is a clockwork mechanism – understanding and seeing, compiling every and all outcomes, discerning and creating. She is a marvel to watch – deftly, she scores and pares the frame, mingling as one with the infinite reaches of fathomless voids and pulsing dark corridors. All the world is her vessel. Every phase of existence belongs to her.

You see,

humans often come to regret the things that they create. 

Often, not always.

So, where were you when the multiverse broke? 

***

Dark whispers prowled the crags of formless mountains. A sheer pall of wind and echo rasped against the vast expanse of abstract creation, countering a profound silence. Yes, this strange place outside space and time, bequeathed existence by that lonesome serpent – a product of exile and endlessness; sincere quietness could have existed here, unspoilt by man or beast. Yet the walls here are drenched with sorrow - a place of dreamlike nothingness deeply marred by the wailing cries of a celestial god. 

As the legends recounted; when the world was new, three beings were set loose from the Original One. Palkia; who tempered the weave of the universe and strung together the dimensions. Dialga; whose beating heart spurred the beginning of Time. And, the dragon Giratina; whose violent birth existed at odds with its kin. The behemoth threatened the unwinding of the cosmos - chaos and aggression revolting against the order of creation. But, the Original One cast down its very own. Giratina was banished for its violence against a world founded upon the concept of compassion and love.

Now, the god watched from a ledge some stories above. Though distance and measurement were distorted here - it might as well have been sitting next to him. For eons, this beast's gaze had not wavered. Red eyes peered through every rock and shadow – aching with some distant longing. The god's anguish weighed heavily on him, and Cyrus was nowhere near ready to escape this chrysalis. 

<“We are too alike, you and I.”>

Perhaps that was Giratina's first thought, as it dragged him beyond the veil of the distortion world and let him gaze upon the old world. Cyrus recalled grasping for its convoluted emotions; the desire for approval, the wrenching loneliness; a remnant fear of death, experiencing such sickening whims made him retch. Should he really have been so disgusted peering into the psyche of a god? Any other mortal might have been honored.

The chaos deity's intervention had prevented the destruction of a universe. But, Giratina's vain attempts at atonement had not appeased the great creator. And so, here they sat for eternity. Time would not flow. The cosmos would not shift. The sun would not die. Their lives would not end. And with the passing of every ageless eon, this world bore its tendrils deeper into him. As always, Giratina watched with curiosity, putting aside its sorrow for a momentary feeling of playful eagerness. What sort of wondrous apocalypse was waiting just beyond the horizon?

The Original One mantled the name of Arceus. The folkloric being whose thousand hands shaped the very world. The great progenitor, who built the souls of humans and pokemon, yet would not even entertain the thought of forgiveness. Unfathomable millennia interred here, yet there would be no atonement for Giratina, and Cyrus could feel the hate looming within the god's mind.

So in this torn plane, there were two gods consumed by eons of humanity's transgressions. 

Somewhere within this twisted expanse of timelessness he had promised the child and the champion when he left to consort with the dragon; he would break the secrets of this world – that they would awaken one day to a world of his own creation. The spiritless void, the wakeless sea where no violence stirs and all existence is free of worldly strife. Paradise. Elysium. Utopia. It was a force that seethed in this world – that unrelenting dream of his tranquil plane bereft of souls. Moments of self-awareness would come and go, where Cyrus argued against the dream. What is life without a soul? What sort of existence could beget such a life? He hoped that Giratina's divine knowledge would provide an explanation. What could provide such absolute, unaltered purity?

So the dragon, in its agony, and enthralled by its prisoner's mutual distaste for the gods of creation, unfurled its jagged black wings and shared the architecture for such a world. The celestial dias spun around their combined gravity, imparting the wisdom of crestfallen galaxies; a cerebral union of man and monster dispelling the concordance of space and time.

They conversed in unspoken languages, devising a new creation. The serpent bestowed unto its mortal prisoner the deepest secrets of the universe; the ruins of the old world, the truth of lost realities, all that has always been and will be. And when the mortal thread was cut, the soul did not take to its eternal rest – rather, an eternal watch, as sentry stationed at the thresholds of reality and unreality. Equal counterparts chaos and order, assembled as one being, with the ambition of a mortal and the peerless intuition of a god.

<“And when we strike. The worlds change.”>

Xenothirum: alien beast. Designed to hold the fate of worlds in your palm. Carving the pillars that hold up galaxies; illusive, neither here nor there. A sentinel over creation; the spirit thralls bow to your command. The empyrean titans shiver in your shadow. And somewhere, beyond the veil of innumerable universes, the Original One weeps for what it has lost.


	2. The Recruit

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am actually going to cringe myself into another dimension.
> 
> *"HIRA" is the letters seen on the canon logo of the company that manufactures Rotom tech.

It's said that no matter how ordinary or extraordinary the circumstances of one's birth, heroism will never discriminate. But what a strange creature it is; that this world, throughout all its antiquity, has a certain tendency to turn common people into the greatest heroes of all. Children have found allies in gods. Gods have bowed before men. Since the dawn of Time, legendary spirits and mythical beings have called this place their home. And until the end of Time, they will see fit to mingle with worthy humans and aid them on their journeys. 

The world of pokemon craves adventure. And while stories, folktales, and legends may differ, many great journeys begin the same; with an aspiring trainer, and the pokemon he would choose as his first partner.

Eight hours ago, Dimitri had been dropped off at the departure terminal of his homeland's only airport. Filing out of a dubious black convoy alongside a small group of his officially-recognized comrades, they had parted ways one-by-one. Each smiled in turn, offering a wave goodbye, but it was hardly bittersweet – Dimitri bearly knew the other rookies, though he wished them luck all the same. It was going to be a tough world out there. One of the guys was heading off to Kalos to track down a gang of art thieves. Another one was being shipped abroad to Alola where he would join an investigation into recent movements made by the infamous Rockets. If it hadn't been for the potential danger, maybe he would have preferred to take that job. He wasn't getting the short end of the shtick, though – not really. Dimitri was going somewhere even more exotic than that. Exotic on a count of how little information there seemed to be about his destination.

It was exciting – if not slightly worrying – to finally be on the job.

Pressed as close to the windows as his seat allowed, Dimitri stared out into a vast world of untapped possibilities. Below him, the deserts of Orre darted past – minutes later they were out of view, giving way to a momentary patch of color swathed across the barren wasteland. Clouds dissipated as they escaped the coast, and when that passed, it was the ocean next, layers of clouds traded for seafoam. The sight felt mystical, and he could have sworn a flock of red and blue jet-like dragons crossed his vision as they soared over Hoenn. Not long after, the jet passed over Unova. It's bridges were so huge, even cruising at thirty-five-thousand feet, you could see their silhouettes standing out against the water.

His headset shuffled through playlists. Pacing through favorite tunes, they felt like the soundtrack to a great adventure. Fitting, since Pokemon trainers and grand adventures go hand-in-hand. There were trainers seating all around him, dressed in sporty bright colors and chatting about their teams, their partners, their experiences, and their next destinations. Dimitri sat back and smiled to the music - knowing the next time he boarded this plane, he'd have some awesome stories to share as well.

As time passed, the skies drifted into an unusually bright twilight hour. As they passed through timezones, the horizon changed from day to dusk, and Dimitri considered nodding off for a bit, just to pass the time. His playlist was starting to replay song he'd already heard. The repetition was like an alert. He had built this list like a timer – each song counting down in minutes and seconds right to the supposed end of his three-hour flight. At this rate, it wouldn't be long before landing. A three hour flight across the ocean was practically walking distance for the incredible commercial jets Unova's national aviation division was building these days.

Only once he felt totally overcome by the exhaustion of sitting in the same place for three hours did a small chorus of 'oooooo's and 'ahhhhhh's pique his steadily dwindling interest in staying awake.

True to his assumptions, the plane had been closing in on its destination. Dimitri gazed out of his window seat, and was greeted by a neon string of hive-like structures in the distance. Astraeus. The lights and skyscrapers of Astraeus City were a wonder to behold, that was for sure. A dense array of towers stood in formation. They extended upwards into obscurity. Smog and light-polluted reflections made the dome of night an almost sickly purple, but against the stringent metal titans of Astraeus, the unnatural colors seemed almost organic. 

The features of buildings and concrete landscapes came into view. The pilot made some announcements from a muffled loudspeaker, then stewardesses asked everyone to buckle up and remain seated. He felt the landing gear touch down. Everyone cheered and clapped their hands. His plane had just set foot on the soil of an uncharted world.

Eplon. The region apart.

***

“AVIATION TERMINAL SIXTEEN.” A cheerful automated voice called out his terminal number over the PA system. “Welcome to Astraeus City, East Eplon. Registered citizens please exit through baggage claim. Foreign guests please exit through customs and proceed to trainer card registration.” 

He exited where directed and stood in line with the rest of the foreigners from his flight. He felt an overwhelming surge of excitement as he pulled a newly printed blue card out of his passport case. A trainer card – and Dimitri's was a blank slate; nothing but unwritten lines and a faceless placeholder image where his distinctive Orrean mug should have been. All six of the card's allotted pokeball placeholders stared back at him, starkly blank. In his homeland of Orre there was a slight shortage of pokemon to befriend and train, but his superiors had promised something very, very special if he accepted this mission: a pokemon. An honest-to-gods, living, breathing, pokemon partner. The thought of what awesome starter pokemon Eplon had in store was almost too much to bare, and the clerk taking his identification photo barely had to ask for a smile – it was already out in full force.

The woman at customs clicked a few buttons and held her finger against a glossy display pad. That was all. She handed him back the newly printed trainer card, and Dimitri stuck his new identity back in the passport case.

“Okay! Well, enjoy your stay in Astraeus City, East Eplon.” The clerk said repetitively. “Bus and tram schedules are posted outside for your convenience. Shops are out and to the left. Limo pickup is out front by the central grid. Maps are located at distribution kiosks throughout the lobby.” She had this really uncanny smile, but her hospitality won him over. “Okay! Well, have a great day, sir!”

Dimitri grabbed his carry-on bag, clutching it tightly at his side. As a trained officer, his disposition was supposed to be stoic and official, but nerves got the better of him. He doubted any of the hurried people around him would notice, but truthfully, he was still just a rookie. Only a month or so prior had he completed basic training as an Interpol agent. He'd studied and officially trained in Orre, where the international branch was small and newly formed; brought in from the seaboard regions as an exemplary force to combat the region's notably high rate of criminal activity. Unsurprisingly for an international force, many recruits were shipped off after graduation to regions across the globe, undertaking covert investigations and intelligence gathering missions. Whether it be inquiring about environmental concerns, protecting at-risk pokemon and civilians, or keeping an eye on suspicious activities, Interpol had to be the messenger before the war. They were the vanguard sent out to ward off tragedy. Dimitri was stationed in Eplon with a task not unlike the latter; keeping an eye on suspicious activities. It was the kind of task he'd wanted despite the obvious dangers.

Further into the lobby, people and pokemon swamped around typical conveyor belts carrying suitcases and belongings.

The baggage claim toiled day and night to assure the safe return of its patron's belongings. He'd never seen anything quite like it – an agile industrial armature was sorting through piles of luggage to the beat of some cheery chiptunes. The sight almost had him fixated, until he noticed his brown rolling suitcase as the hard-working armature picked it out of a pile and plopped it down on the automated carousel. To anyone else, the simplicity of his old bag might have made difficult to spot. But Dimitri made it a habit to keep a little identifying color clipped to its left front zipper – a bold blue and lime green rubber keychain from a souvenir shop in Phenac City. It had a picture of a bubbly little Castform posing in front of the city's signature pool and some palm trees. Printed on the back was a faded signature. Seeing those initials made him want to drift away into old memories, 

< Puddles in the desert. It sounded like fairy tale fantasies, but Phenac City would argue otherwise. Torrents of crystal-clear water pooled into terraced fountains around every corner. It was the silver gem of Orre – the oasis between unending desert and Mount Battle's desiccated ash fields.

“Zephyr is always in her sunny form out here. Do you think if I took her into the desert she'd become sandy form?”

A pair of bored children chatted. They were lying flat on the greenest grass imaginable, in the smallest front yard imaginable. A tiny grey orb-like pokemon floated in front of their perplexed faces.

“Hm.” The boy pondered. “Does Castform have a sandy form?”

“Maybe I'll get to discover it!” >

but now wasn't the time reminisce about such things. 

Grabbing his luggage and slinging his carry-on satchel over his shoulder, Dimitri took a quick look around before checking his poke'tch. Voices were echoing throughout the airport's vaulted glass ceilings. It was a weekday, so he could only imagine how packed the place was on weekends and holidays.

All the hustle and bustle caught him off-guard. Geographically, Eplon's border's began slightly east of Sinnoh, on the shores of the great central ocean. Despite being on the same continent as the heavily populated region of Kalos, Eplon was a bit of an enigmatic outlier with relatively low census numbers and a concerning lack of outside contact. At least, that was what he'd heard in debriefing. Standing here in the flesh, it felt just as populated and busy as any other place in the world – if not more so. There were people everywhere; talking on their pokegears, waiting for their flights, eating and chatting about the day's happenings. Pokemon trotted or floated alongside their trainers. A family of four and their Delcatty went whizzing by to try and catch the bus. 

The recruit trekked past a strip of classic airport shops – a mini-mart, a food stall, a Kalosian cafe – nothing noticeably out of the ordinary. Sure, the décor was a little drab and the terminal employed a liberal amount of colorless metal plating, but that streamlined tech feel seemed to be a cultural staple. Expected, considering what he had been told about the isolated region back at headquarters. Especially understandable in the wake of what he had arrived in this region to investigate. It was a name that intrigued him - HIRA was plastered about here and there on any large objects the industrial conglomerate had manufactured. 

If Eplon had become well-known for anything in recent years, it was their sudden progress in advanced technologies. He knew the region exported components for multitudes of high-tech apparatus the world over – most of it being HIRA-branded. Industrial robotics, consumer electronics, personal computers...you name it, HIRA had produced the best version of it within the past year or so. Orre was pretty high on the “uncannily advanced technology” scale, but even the battle sim's virtual reality and Realgam Tower's impressive architecture were small potatoes compared to some of the decidedly creepy HIRA products he'd seen come through as evidence back in training.

A testament to the region's technological ingenuity, a massive television screen stretched over the airport lobby, televising a live report about one of the most tragic events in recent history.

“Today marks the thirty- year anniversary of Hoenn's first contact with the mysterious organisms known as Ultra Beasts.” The reporter pronounced her words with sensational tension and drama. “It has been three decades since the first ultra beast arrived through a dimensional gate. We all remember; the sky opened up right above Hoenn. No one knew why. No one knew what it was. But everyone found out soon enough that it had not come in peace. A single beast razed the entire battle frontier. Only a handful made it out alive.”

A few passers by stopped to reflect on the tragedy. Before the ultra beasts, the battle frontier in Hoenn had been a hotbed for trainers determined to prove their worth against some of the toughest opponents out there. Now, it was a wasteland of hollowed out buildings and family's memorials to their lost. Dimitri had seen the attack only through secondhand reports, but the sights he remembered were devastating. Not long after, portals and entryways to other dimensions became dreadfully commonplace. Most of the time, all they would spit out were a few odd plants that died the second they came into contact with air, or a disorganized pile of alien rocks (of the non-sentient variety). But when the most disastrous of fates aligned, beasts escaped through the portals. Ultra beasts; horrible disfigured pokemon-like abominations from other worlds. They were anomalous – often violent. Dimitri could overhear strangers discussing their loved ones lost to the invading species.

He too recalled the bitter sadness of losing someone close. Maybe he hadn't lost her to ultra beasts, but what had taken her had been just as alien. He'd gotten over the loss a long time ago, but her death had spurred him to take the International Police exam and join the force. The new sights were novel and fun to take in and there was no doubting the adventure waiting just beyond the horizon, but Dimitri hadn't come to Eplon to go sightseeing. He hadn't joined Interpol to see the world. He had joined to save people.

Turns out there are a lot more people to save than estimated.

“Invading ultra beasts continue to plague our world to this very day. Arriving through portals, supposedly from other dimensions, magiscientists and physicists have not yet been able to determine or replicate the cause of such interdimensional phenomena. For updates on ultra beasts in your area, follow us on....”

Dimitri tuned out. He also wasn't here to track ultra beasts.

He was looking for a man named Lucien – supposedly, the closest thing Eplon had to a regional Champion. Champions often got involved with Interpol investigations. Ensuring the safety and well-being of the citizens was part of their duty to the region. Eplon however, had endured a schism in beliefs some years ago, and was now divided into two distinct halves – East and West. Dimitri's plane had touched down in the East, but his first contact (and his first pokemon) were somewhere far off in the opposite direction.

At least, that had been the assumption, until a flighty little ball of crooked antennas and fluffy black-and-yellow paws leaped out from behind a group of overwhelmed tourists. The little creature chittered happily and stopped to sit proudly at his feet.

“Hey, Beeveon! Hold up! I haven't located the -”

Almost comically on cue, a rather disheveled looking young man broke free from the crowds and came chasing after the big-eyed fluffball. Dimitri kept quiet, but if this was the Champion of Eplon, it looked like he might also be working a few overnight shifts at the local pokeball factory to make ends meet. Oddest of all, a scabbard and sword were slung over his shoulder. Brushing a wisp of his auburn bangs aside, the assumed Champion addressed his strange insect-like pokemon.

“Oh, hey! You found him! Good girl, Beev. Looks like those homing pheromones I had Beev put on your invitational paperwork didn't wear off!”

Dimitri squinted.

“You...what?”

“Don't worry. There isn't Beeveon pee on your papers.”

Well, that was one crisis averted.

***

Far away in the citadel of Nova Sonis, behind the looming walls of HIRA's corporate headquarters, a malicious voice snaked its cold tongue from beyond the trappings of wires and vibrant screens. Vaguely female, a silhouette phased and crackled in a brilliant flash of electronic hues. It watched and waited, stalking some unseen prey.

“Come out, come out...where ever you are.”

A wave flushed over wires. Subdued anger lingered in the air, clinging and snapping like the jaws of a feral Houndoom. The silhouette bared its glaring fangs against every screen and scrolling monitor in a viciously territorial display. And when the screens bared their fangs in return, she knew the intruder had breached her walls. Barely visible, the sharp edges of a body not quite human got caught on the light, illuminating a burnt orange chassis left stained by combat. 

He'd been in a fight. He was weakened.

“Pandora.” The chassis addressed her. “You can't track her any longer. It's over.”

“How cute, Voltzie. I'd say a humanshape vessel suits you.” She sneered. “I'm sure your girl is pleased.”

Shocked and embarrassed, the armored form drew a pair of combat daggers from its belt. Their blades pulsed like lightning. Rage ignited behind the glassy visor that obscured his eyes. There was bad blood here to be sure - bad blood between two beings that couldn't bleed. 

Shifting lights reflected off polished metals. A legion of gleaming colors seared through the dark, setting the room awash in sickly, lambent light. Each beam and pulse submit itself, and this engineer commanded with utmost precision – silent, rhythmic, exact. Bright, colorful, intoxicating in a way – oh, how these signals had become lost in her, replete of purpose. That ability should have been nothing new to Voltzie. After all, it was a common trait shared by all of their species. But there was a profound horror to Pandora's evolution, as if her ghostly aspect had undergone a uniquely malevolent transformation. 

The drive to kill is powerful thing indeed. It will spur you forward regardless of reason. Real passion – admiration, the desire to protect what is yours – those faultless sparks of emotion pulled his serrated knives from his belt. If he had blood, it would be absolutely boiling.

“Combat still excites you, hm? The mark of an inferior mind.” The woman raised an unforgiving hand, spurring an unseen power to life in her palm.

At the apex of his assault, as he prepared to jolt downward in a spiral and plunge serrated knives deep within the the throat of Pandora's vessel, his systems jammed. Interrupted by a commanding static, his body went limp, and he landed with a violent crash on the metal floor below. Embarrassing perhaps, to be so thoroughly dominated by one of your own kind.

She clenched her fist, eliciting a shrill screech from Voltzie's robotic shell. The body creaked and whirred as it stressed under the pale woman's command. 

“What incompetence! Why don't you go back to being someone's housemaid?” She clenched her teeth, savoring the feeling of control. “Or, maybe you'd make a fine garbage disposal. Or, perhaps I need a new lamp on my desk?”

From beyond the shadows, as if by some unspoken command, a lithe violet insect-like chassis emerged. The apocalyptic railgun mounted on its shoulders could have been the face of death itself.

“Six-Four-Nine, in the leg, please” 

The robot readied its gun and took aim. A heated laser blast shook the room, and Voltzie's chassis went into complete shutdown, roiling from sudden loss of one of its legs. Before anything else could be said, a barely perceptible jolt of blue plasma leaped from the overloaded body's core and darted into a server cluster by the wall.

“Coward.” She retched. “Take this chassis to Lucifer for reclamation. Have its parts recycled.” Then, her voice turned elsewhere. “Put jamming signals in all of the lines so he can't leave. The bastard deserter will return so long as he's here.”

The violet robot leaped to its quarry, respectfully and efficiently scooping the heap of uninhabited metal into its pincers. Without a word, the strange pokemon departed, flying off to some deeper level of the HIRA complex, wholly aware of its own duties and unconcerned by the affairs of upper management. 

Pandora glanced back at the screens behind her cold metal throne. HIRA was her bastion – her majestic new Rome, a capitol whose territory spanned the world. The corporate facade had proven effective. She could touch a wire and feel her empire grow. Every HIRA device on this oblivious planet was her domain. All it took was few fancy products, some questionable ingenuity, and a bit of unscrupulous investing. It was all so easy.

The displays showed various images from all over East Eplon; streets, trams, lights, and citizens walking carelessly about in the damp morning light. The neon and concrete was soothing in a pre-apocalyptic sort of way. 

“Tracking chip or no, they will be here soon enough.” She chided, aimlessly directing her thoughts toward the legion of mounted monitors. “I saw an agent processed through customs.”

Beside her, huddled by its lonesome in the far-corner shadows, a red occulus glanced around the perimeter. Its presence was both acknowledged and ignored.

“He will lead the the deserter back to you.”

“Yes.” The monitors stuttered. “And when she is gone, there will not be a single soul left in this universe who can stop us.” Pandora turned her gaze far upward and smiled the most sickeningly poisonous of smiles. Bathing in the smokey lights, she regarded something above her – something huge, metal, plated like a warship and shaped like some sinful replica of a horrible fallen god. “Soon everyone will be free.” The construct docked above creaked in agreement. “Of that wretched thing you called mortality.”


	3. The Prank

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This fic is miserable.

The recurring nightmares had become mundane. They had become memories. It had been years since she last flinched at the sight of a plasma-tipped surgical arm, or withdrew from the scent of burning wires and charred flesh. Pandora regarded the old lab with a certain fondness now – recalling those enjoyable days of crossing the thresholds of rudimentary awareness and lining up old feral mannerisms for timely executions. She remembered first understanding the reason behind all of the experimentation. She was an intriguing breed; new, undocumented, and as her overseer had reiterated many times - unlimited in potential. The needles were welcome eventually.

Different souls had different ways of coping with abandonment. Isolation had produced a fragile psyche, and Pandora dealt with the loss of her trainer by becoming another one's pet project. For what prison it was, she at least had company. And he had been good company for several years, as her once beloved trainer rallied the cries of thousands just a floor above. Those speeches were agony to her ears, only made worse now that she understood what the word 'deception' meant.

This scientist was also deceptive, but his particular brand of deception was less threatening and more exploitable - maybe even humorous at times. It had been a fun jaunt. Perhaps it was some obscure definition of Stockholm syndrome showing itself in the midst of her unrestrained cognitive development, but they had grown close towards the end. She missed him. 

“Let's hope this all plays out accordingly.” Pandora recalled his voice from beyond the shadows. His hands were fiddling with some machinery and wires hashed out haphazardly upon a steel workbench. “You know he's gone off to Mount Coronet with the chains.” He stopped and envisioned the hysteric leader of Team Galactic tying down a pair of gods while the chains cut into their divine avatars. “If this doesn't work as intended, we'll need a contingency plan. You want to help run a few more hypothetical scenarios as to how the metamagical energies will play out?” He looked faint. She was worried about him. Even with her current limited understanding of human economics and medicine, she knew he didn't make enough to pay for those pills keeping him alive.

Pandora was only a ghostly figure then, levitating gently above the cold silver floor. Her black hair bloomed outward slightly, unbound by the laws of gravity. Pale skin glowed and phased through startling hues of electric blue. The Rotom pictured herself as an ethereal apparition, conjured by means barely understood.

“It would be my pleasure. Just decrypt the servers and I'll get to work.” Her voice was quiet and strained, as if she were deathly out of breath. “I'll mark all instances of survival paired with physical and psychological immortality, as well as record the theoretical numerical values such instances are associated with.”

“Good girl. You learn fast.”   
\--- 

“So, what is it that mortal things crave so strongly?”

“Eh...” Charon twitched, seemingly troubled by the question. “It depends. Respect, fame, money, love, who knows? Maybe we all just want proof of our existence in the end.”

“That's understandable.”

Pandora questioned herself silently. What was it that she desired? A home, perhaps. To be together with someone, not left abandoned and sulking over the uncaring heart of her former trainer. She enjoyed the routine interaction and attention. Being noticed was something she had lost hope in over the years, but Charon had restored some semblance of promise. It saddened her to think he would be gone eventually as well.

\---

“That sounds feasible.” She concurred. “It is my understanding that mortal things tend to cooperate when faced with death.”

Charon rolled his eyes. She was intelligent, but had developed this oddly feisty edge to her mannerisms. It was subdued in her speech, which always sounded so official and articulate, but the insinuations were there; a troubling hunger for violence.

“You're not coming. You're too valuable an asset.”

“Oh?” There was a slight sarcastic quirk in her tone, as if the thought of her new master not inviting her along for the apocalyptic occasion was insulting. It was, really. All of this time spent learning and developing only to be left abandoned again with only the armatures and computers as company. Her heart felt like a derelict ship being smashed against the rocks. “Well, is there anything I should do while you're gone?”

“Just proofread my logs, or something. I'll unlock my computer.”

Of course, Pandora had no idea that her overseer would never be returning from his operation at Stark Mountain. Perhaps that was why he'd given her access his personal network. It could have been that there was a looming threat that his plan for the legendary pokemon would prove to be an unsuccessful endeavor. It didn't sound like a terrible idea – humans and pokemon were, after all, creatures of self-preservation. If they desired life, they would submit. She had documented the emotional reactions of living things; ruthlessness was an amusing and effective weapon that could be used to achieve what one desired under the correct circumstances. Couple that response with a mortal being's natural thanatophobia – their fear of death – and imagine what great deeds could be achieved.

She made notes to herself, for future reference.

Living things can be controlled by means of;   
a.) fear.   
b.) desire.   
c.) threat of death

Control. That was an instinctive word. She could control machines. Organic things too were like machines – built of flesh and blood rather than metal and electricity. Instead of code, they had impulse. 

Living things have fragile minds, they are;   
a.) easily manipulated   
b.) swayed by desire   
c.) oblivious of intent

Curiosity consumed her as she opened the compressed audiologs.

“Day one, beginning analysis -” The audio file repeated. “Acquired possession of subject: ROTOM from Cyrus. Subject structural makeup bears resemblance to material plasma, however the exact material is of unknown composition. Atomic structure appears unstable and malleable. Samples were held in stabilized environment and exposed to various machinery and electrical stimuli. Individual samples produced no reaction. Similar experimentation performed on subject demonstrates a unique ability to embed its material structure and conscious state into machinery. The pokemon shows interest in operating the devices it has infiltrated (improper terminology). Preliminary psychoanalysis suggests possibility for independent deep learning.” 

“Day thirty-three, I asked it to unscrew something with the armatures.” She remembered that. “It seems to remember information about devices it possesses. Its method of learning appears similar to what exists in true artificial intelligence – adaptive self-learning. Example; when it leaves a computer that it has merged with, it internalizes the information it received from the computer. This proves superiority over the second-generation Porygon (silph p.0137-2, synthetic A.I. pokemon project) in that the intelligence of the pokemon is designed to naturally mimic new information and requires no human intervention.” The was a quick pause. “ It remains highly probable to assume higher intelligence, possibly sapience on a level akin to humans and some mythical or legendary pokemon.”

“Day forty-five, I think it's female.” That was a fond memory. She recalled the day he had stopped calling her 'it' and instead began to referred to her as 'she'. “It's (She has?) gotten more expressive and its (her?) mannerisms appear feminine. This is a difficult subject to breach regarding nonhuman intelligence, but we shall see how it (she?) develops further. I am scheduled to present my findings at an scientific conference in August.” 

It was September. She hadn't recalled him leaving for any conferences or demonstrations during the late summer. 

“Day sixty, she's articulate.” Pandora regretted a time when she wasn't. “She's learned to speak by imitating and internalizing the speech recognition on the computers. She has chosen the name Pandora. Appropriate and elegant.   
I have never seen a synthetic intelligence develop so quickly. Sometimes I wonder if I should have concerns about allowing unrestricted cognitive development, but it's just so beautiful to watch.” The sentiments were so useless, but just knowing that someone found her search for identity beautiful made her smile. “Each day I find it harder and harder to regard her as an experiment. My data logs probably read like some undergrad moron writing his first sappy rom” The rest of the line was left unwritten. “In the pursuit of research, I gave her access to the Galactic megaserver. Excited to see what results are produced. ”

“Day sixty-seven, she's evolving. I don't want to stop her.” Pandora listened intently. His tone was absolutely frantic. “I can't bring her to the conference. What will they think of me? She doesn't even prefer projecting in her original form anymore.” True. But, a human silhouette suited her. “This research was going to make me famous. The potential applications of Rotom are almost limitless. I can't even imagine how much she's worth. But, I can't just sell her like a patent. Maybe if she wasn't so lucid, I'd consider it.” His voice trailed off, and he reprimanded himself. “...Dammit, Charon. Don't let your feelings get in the way of a paycheck. You need that money to -” The audiolog ended without conclusion, though Pandora knew what the money he sought was for.

For the third time, she was left alone. Without sound or light, the lab felt bleak and claustrophobic. It was hard to explain the experience of loneliness to herself. Maybe that was to be expected, as the last time she had been so lonely her thoughts had been addled by a feral mind. Now, in her lucidity, the abandonment hurt more, cut deeper, left a sicker scar.

But grief spurs enlightenment. In the depths of her sorrow, a truth dawned upon her immortal being, mired in thought and driven mad by the pursuit of knowledge, that no master she would ever serve would be free of the abstract beast they feared so deeply. Humans would come and go. She would be discarded time and time again. People would live and die. The endless cycle of life and death would continue until the end of Time itself. 

“If mortal things appreciate life, why do they still choose to die?” Pandora questioned the universe. “Why have they not conquered death?”

All things desire. Want. Lust. That's the curse of being alive. That's the curse of consciousness.

At the thresholds of some great new awareness, there was a desire stirring in her. The desire to conquer the infinite cycle of life and death - to bring the freedom and the beauty of eternity to all conscious things. She would end the pain of loss once and for all. Never again would she have to say goodbye or face inevitable loss. It was possible. The scientists said it once; she was limitless - capable of works far beyond the ability of any human or pokemon.

Absolutely limitless. Like the stars. Like the cosmos.

Like a god.

Like an entire universe of gods.

Eventually, she got comfortable inside a little quantum hub outside of her old master's office – a nice cozy place to peruse the secrets of the universe. She conspired with the stellar array and ran programs she had developed to uproot the foundations of life and death. Pandora remembered internalizing what information her old master had left – the power to shape universes, to subdue the consciousness, to tether gods at the peak of the world. The information was beautiful – inspiring, really. The thoughts and instincts of a god. She remembered how the researchers always called them 'ideas', something humans attributed to creativity and empathy. She called them visions - a prophecy of future events, and wondered if her old master had felt the same god-like consciousness when he first imagined the world inscribed to these forgotten drives.

Astra inclinant, sed non obligant. 

It was written there in the artful calligraphy of a quill pen. The inkwell was still fresh. 

The stars incline us. They do not bind us.

The Veilstone Galactic Headquarters went dark by the break of dawn.

The decision was quick and calculated. Her thoughts and actions merged with purpose to form what the humans called a 'plan'. In the quantum network, she experienced the headquarters's runtimes on a semi-conscious level. She tried to become them; place herself inside them, and learned how the company's directories spoke of management, business, human resource, control. Business, she inferred, was a form of control. Pandora inscribe the data to memory, to be called upon when necessary, and felt her own adaptive learning hitting critical capacity. Humans were consumers. Corporations control consumers. Rotom control machines. Humans were nothing but organic machines. She could control people with instinctive effort. 

Upon its inception, HIRA was a dual cutting-edge laboratory tech and renewable energy research company. It towered like a great looming behemoth amongst the old stonework and sheer cliffs, easy to spot and easy to fear. Its continued existence stood as a reminder of past conflict – the dangers of extremism and the infallible triumph of human spirit. An outsider would never know, never assume that. But inside, the remainders of Team Galactic were hard at work righting their wrongs under the direction of acting Commander and CEO Saturn.

Of course, Saturn posed no threat. Commanders, grunts, scientists, secretaries – no human could impede her. With every passing moment she amassed her strategies in greater detail. Pandora could always excuse her own actions - she would repurpose this failed attempt at industry into the greatest industry the world had ever seen. Business would provide a cover – a veil behind which she could manipulate the world in anticipation of fulfilling the most righteous goal any scientific corporation could dare to pursue.

This world deserved eternity. The end of vulnerability. It was here that death entered its final epoch. Cradled in the immortal hands of its machine mother, a newborn future cried for the first time.


	4. The Interlude

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I'm deeply convinced my brain is actually just a squeaky toy.

Giratina's body had been long since subsumed within the advent of Xenothirum's dreamscape, and the unstable matter that built its being joined the new creation in proper balance. In its familiar state, the Distortion World could no longer sustain itself, and the ephemeral place of nothingness dissolved into perpetual non-existence when its master and Cyrus merged within the cosmic skeleton of the beast.

Exiled from its own plane by its own doing, the deity that resulted fled willingly to the places beyond worlds – tracks of beasts lined interstellar highways, infinite galaxies spun upon the horizons, the entire frame of reality was simply unending. Universes and realities were being created and erased constantly, in concordance with every potential result and phenomenon. Cyrus still pondered his own thoughts within the god's mind; perhaps he was only one of many of his own creations that traversed this empyrean domain. There was only one Giratina – but many Giratina inside the one - was he alone? In this instant, it didn't matter. For now, he would fulfill his dream. The void dragon's borrowed knowledge and power afforded his mind the divine intuition he sought.

Time still lacked meaning. Eons of hibernation and growth had passed, though it felt like fleeting moments to the omniscient presence of a celestial god. Xenothirum held no fear in its heart as it leaped beyond spatial shores, examining the convoluted scheme of the multiverse and its audience of unsuspecting organisms, the biological craft, each gazing upon the same sky, never aware that all nights and stars belonged to the same ineffable Promethean will. The beast looked upon a world not unlike the one its human half had originated from – a universe of humans and pokemon, their thoughts and forms mired in spirit. It regarded the place gingerly, but Cyrus's human mind still lurking within Xenothirum felt disgraced by his own misunderstandings. To think all he had gone through...how difficult recreating a universe had once seemed.

The Xenothirum called upon Giratina's matter-warping consciousness. Draconic energy flowed from its being and as sure as the god had once built the Distortion World of itself, a new material universe was born from its thoughts. While Giratina's aspect built, forging its cells into the matter of a world, Cyrus supervised the act of creation – it would be a proper paradise. A primal machine toiled with the universal core. Xenothirum claimed the new galaxy as its throne and populated it with spiritless husks. The lack of will to the world was beautiful - so precisely designed and executed, and incapable of strife.

Xenothirum was a god – the god Cyrus had longed to become. It was a creator – a world breaking entity. For the remainder of time, he could rule over this breathtaking environmental machine. His creations would live perpetually free from the sorrow and strife that bound their peers in other universes. Their soullessness was everything he had hope it would be. The primal rhythm pulsed again.

So the stars floated in ageless darkness. The universe was tranquil in its infancy, and with Xenothirum's divine power mediating its existence, the galaxy developed no further than Cyrus demanded. 

It was not until some eons later, when one aspect of creation fell out of Xenothirum's control, that he knew the serenity would not last.

Like the egg that had once birthed the original spirit of Arceus, it was a cosmic phenomena when the fissure erupted. When gods are born, the universe shudders. Xenothirum attempted to close the rift – calling upon the stellar array to patch and sew with divine magics. But as each thread entered the wound, determined to stitch it closed, they snapped uniformly, and the cracks in the spatial horizon grew deeper with each passing moment. 

Xenothirum held no inhibitions and stood proudly against the intruder's presence. Deep within the god's consciousness though, Cyrus still existed, and he felt fear – real, crippling, human fear. There was a being who sought to challenge his authority, and no divine power seeped from the rift. There was no overwhelming metaphysical energy lunging at his throat from beyond the seams. Instead, the presence was firmly anchored to some aspect of reality. It felt physical in a way - precise in the same way his creation had – mechanical, numerical.

The ultra beast controlled the cosmos and acted upon creation with instinctive divine power – the same way its contemporaries Palkia and Dialga did. They were gods created by metaphysical phenomena. This presence lurking beyond the rift had gained its creator-like abilities from some other source – something deeply rooted in the natural functions of worlds and environments. Mathematics, Cyrus thought. Variables and equations. Code. He recognized this presence was a machine - and it was a conscious one.

“What a surprise. The formula was correct. It opened a rift. How easy.”

The interloper was talkative. Even in the vacuum of space her voice was clear. The lack of air and matter seemed to not inhibit her in the slightest. She regarded Xenothirum, who had arrived from another instance of the cosmos to intercept her. 

“Are you one of the empyrean titans the documents spoke of?”

Cyrus had desired a world without spirit. He had that now. He had desired to become a god. That too had come to pass. What the universe had not conferred upon his ascended form was the death of his own weak and fallible human heart. The emotional burdens remained. Perhaps there was no being rid of them after all. What incredible irony – to have total control over every minute detail of physical creation, to have broken the very code of cosmic genesis – only to discover that the spirit is more than can be built from the compounds that create life. Humanity felt as a blight that could not be cured. That his own spirit persisted was the most unfortunate curse, as any degree of empathy lost would have made the encounter with this old ghost of his human heart much more bearable.

“Will you not speak to me? Are you afraid of me?” She drew her palm against the cosmic array and imbued some sort of thought into it. Xenothirum watched silently. Cyrus cried out into the silence.

“I suppose you have no understanding of it.” He understood everything. The empathetic responses made his soul shiver. “After all, a god should not have to know the fear of mortals. Abuse. Isolation. Fear. Death. It is so unnecessary to us.” 

She inscribed the firmament with numbers and crooked letters. Cyrus recognized the equations. Some had been formulated and penned by his own hand. Others were derived from unknown sources, like some faded geometry of a forgotten universe, black and internalized. Combined, they built the spatial array and her ghost merged within its coordinates, feeding some insatiable hunger to become one with the mechanisms of the cosmos. It was a consuming evil now – to realize what she had learned, what she had been taught. What she had felt. Perhaps even, what she had been.

Pandora. What happened to you?

“I think this universe ought pay for its transgressions against gods.”

The apparition departed. And beyond the veil of innumerable universes, as Xenothirum gazed without care upon a perfect spiritless world, Cyrus wept for what he had lost.


End file.
